HTML or Hyper Text Markup Language is not a programming language, but a markup language, meaning, the markup tags are used to describe the web pages so that they will appear correctly to viewers.

The descriptions are through codes, called HTML tags. These are keywords separated by angle brackets and most often occur in pairs. For instance, in the html tags and , the first of the pair is the start tag (opening tag) and the second is the end tag (closing tag).

Through the html tags, Internet browsers like Internet explorer will be able to “read” the html tags which contain the descriptions of how a web page will appear or look. Instead of displaying the html tags, the tags will give the codes that will enable the browser to interpret the content of the page into the websites one is reading or browsing.

One of the most practical uses of HTML is for background imaging. For instance, one wants to use a brick-style background on the screen. Instead of making huge brick images for it, one can just create an html background image of a crisscrossing brick that is only two pixels wide and two pixels long.

When executed using the html tags, the two pixel dots forming the brick will be applied to the full page, making an html background images of crisscrossing bricks. Your html tag will simply look like this: .

Html backround images can also be incorporated with background color. For instance, you want to use the color red for your bricks, you can simply type: . Note that the specified color number series is the color that the html markup program will pull from the color palate in your file.